Koei Net Freezes Japanese Game Rental Program

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No rentals for you!

By Anoop Gantayat

A trial for Koei Net's RentaNet game rental program for the Japanese market will come to an end on 2/28, a bit later than the originally planned date of late August, 2006. The only problem is, the full service might never become a reality.

Koei Net announced this past week that it has decided to freeze the full RentaNet program. As reason for the decision, the company cited difficulties in making its rental business model work.

The company will post a special loss for the current financial term of 32,495,000 yen due to the cancellation.

RentaNet debuted on a trial basis at six Geo retail outlets starting May of last year. The service places electronic rental kiosks at retailers. Consumers access these kiosks to rent game software, with pricing determined by the age of the title and the period of the rental.

Gamer makers like Sony Computer Entertainment, Bandai Namco Games, Square Enix and Koei itself signed up for the trial service, offering some 70 PlayStation 2 titles up for rental.

The trial was supposed to end in August, followed by an expansion to multiple shops, eventually reaching 1000 retailers by 2007.